A note on the Milky Way as a barred galaxy

Abstract

We review recent research on the Milky Way galaxy and try to investigate whether its shape is similar to other barred galaxies. The emphasis is given on microlensing research because this method can be useful in determining the shape of the Galaxy with the minimal set of assumptions. By analyzing plots of the microlensing optical depth, $τ$ as a function of galactic coordinates for different values of the axis ratio, $q$ of the galactic halo, we have shown that observations are best described by a flattened halo with $0.2 ^<_\sim q ^<_\sim 0.6$.